1.

BUSH CALLS ON IRAN TO 'COME CLEAN'
By Ben Feller

Associated Press
December 5, 2007

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071205/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush

OMAHA, Neb. -- President Bush, trying to keep pressure on Iran, called on Tehran Wednesday to "come clean" about the scope of its nuclear activities or else face diplomatic isolation.

Two days after a new intelligence report said that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program four years ago, Bush demanded that Tehran detail its previous program to develop nuclear weapons "which the Iranian regime has yet to acknowledge."

"The Iranians have a strategic choice to make," he said. "They can come clean with the international community about the scope of their nuclear activities, and fully accept the long-standing offer to suspend their enrichment program and come to the table and negotiate, or they can continue on a path of isolation."

The administration is worried that the new National Intelligence Estimate -- representing a consensus of all U.S. spy agencies -- weakens its leverage over Iran and its ability to build global pressure on Tehran to stop its uranium enrichment program.

Bush, arriving here on a campaign fundraising trip, said he had consulted with members of his national security team, who gave him a report about what Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley have learned in talks during the past several days with their counterparts in Britain, Germany, France, and Russia.

"These countries understand that the Iranian nuclear issue is a problem, and continues to be a problem and must be addressed," Bush said.

Backing the U.S. intelligence community, Bush said he appreciated its work in helping people to understand past and present activities in Iran and helping the administration develop a sound policy.

"It is clear from the latest NIE that the Iranian government has more to explain about its nuclear intentions and past actions," Bush said.

His statement Wednesday came a day after a news conference called in part to react to the new information on Iran's nuclear activities. Bush's public remarks, coupled with frenzied contacts with world leaders by Bush, Rice, and Hadley, show a White House trying to keep the world on board with its hard line against Tehran -- an uphill effort now, according to most analysts.

Also Wednesday, the White House said the United States will continue "actively pushing" for a third, tougher round of United Nations sanctions against Iran. Deputy press secretary Tony Fratto said Iran continues to hide information, remains in violation of two U.N. Security Council resolutions, tests ballistic missiles, and is enriching uranium.

"Anyone who thinks that the threat from Iran has receded or diminished is naive and is not paying attention to the facts," Fratto told reporters flying aboard Air Force One with Bush en route to Nebraska.

Fratto disputed Iran's claim that the intelligence estimate was a vindication for Tehran. "I think that's absolutely absurd, and Iran should take no comfort or vindication from the NIE," he said.

He rejected calls, since the new report, for the administration to enter into unconditional talks with Iran, something the White House has said it would only do once Tehran stops enriching uranium.

Tehran says its nuclear program is only for civilian energy purposes. It says it is allowed to enrich uranium for that reason.

Rice, traveling in Africa Wednesday, questioned the openness of the Iranian government after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said the new U.S. intelligence review amounted to "a final shot" against Tehran's critics.

Rice declined to respond to Ahmadinejad's remark, but told reporters in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa that the public release of the NIE showed the administration was committed to transparent democracy, while Iran was not.

"I am not going to comment on that comment except to say that what the National Intelligence Estimate shows, and the transparency with which the administration released it, is what it means to live in a democracy and I hope one day that the people of Iran will live in a democracy too," she said.

Rice said that the latest U.S. intelligence estimate did not mean that Washington no longer considered Tehran a threat and urged the international community not to back down at the U.N. Security Council on pressuring Iran to halt its activities that could produce the ingredients for an atomic weapon.

"It is the very strong view of the administration that the Iranian regime remains a problematic and dangerous regime and that the international community must continue to unite around the Security Council resolutions that have passed," she said.

"Iran needs to stop enrichment and reprocessing activities because those enriching and reprocessing activities permit, if they are perfected, a state to acquire fissile material for a nuclear weapon," Rice said.

2.

IAEA: U.S. IRAN REPORT MATCHES U.N. AGENCY
By William J. Kole

Associated Press
December 4, 2007

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-7126061,00.html

VIENNA -- A new U.S. intelligence review that concludes Iran stopped developing a nuclear weapons program in 2003 is consistent with the U.N. atomic watchdog agency's own findings and "should help to defuse the current crisis," the organization's chief said Tuesday.

"Although Iran still needs to clarify some important aspects of its past and present nuclear activities, the agency has no concrete evidence of an ongoing nuclear weapons program or undeclared nuclear facilities in Iran," International Atomic Energy Agency director-general Mohamed ElBaradei said in a statement.

ElBaradei said he viewed "with great interest" Monday's release of a U.S. National Intelligence Estimate that said Tehran halted nuclear weapons development in late 2003 under international pressure.

The chief U.S. envoy to the IAEA, Gregory L. Schulte, said the U.S. assessment contained "some positive news" and raised hopes of a peaceful and diplomatic end to the standoff.

"It does make us more hopeful that diplomacy can succeed, but for diplomacy to succeed, we still need to keep the pressure on while giving Iran a negotiated way out," Schulte told reporters in Vienna.

But "Iran's nuclear file is not closed," he said, adding that the U.S. report "shows we were right to be concerned."

The U.S. report noted that Iran continues to enrich uranium, and senior officials in Washington said that means it still may be able to develop a weapon between 2010 and 2015.

Monday's finding was a shift from two years ago, when U.S. intelligence agencies said they believed Tehran was determined to develop a nuclear capability and was continuing its weapons development program. It suggests that Iran is susceptible to diplomatic pressure, the officials said.

ElBaradei, who was traveling in South America on Tuesday, said the new assessment "should help to defuse the current crisis" over Iran's suspect nuclear program and growing fears that Washington may be gearing up for a possible conflict with the Islamic Republic.

"At the same time, it should prompt Iran to work actively with the IAEA to clarify specific aspects of its past and present nuclear program," he said. "This would allow the agency to provide the required assurances regarding the nature of the program."

In his statement, ElBaradei called on Iran to "accelerate" its cooperation with the IAEA and for all parties "to enter without delay into negotiations."

"Such negotiations are needed to build confidence about the future direction of Iran's nuclear program -- concern about which has been repeatedly expressed by the Security Council," he said.

"They are also needed to bring about a comprehensive and durable solution that would normalize the relationship between Iran and the international community," ElBaradei said.

--Associated Press Writer Veronika Oleksyn in Vienna contributed to this report.

3.

World

Middle East

MONITORING AGENCY PRAISES U.S. REPORT, BUT KEEPS WARY EYE ON IRAN
By Elaine Sciolino

New York Times
December 4, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/world/middleeast/05iran.html

PARIS -- The International Atomic Energy Agency on Tuesday publicly embraced the new American intelligence assessment stating that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons effort, but in truth the agency is taking a more cautious approach in drawing conclusions about Iran’s nuclear program.

“To be frank, we are more skeptical,” a senior official close to the agency said. “We don’t buy the American analysis 100 percent. We are not that generous with Iran.”

The official called the American assertion that Iran had “halted” its weapons program in 2003 “somewhat surprising.”

That the nuclear watchdog agency based in Vienna is sounding a somewhat tougher line than the Bush administration is surprising, given that the administration has long criticized it for not pressuring Iran hard enough to curb its nuclear program.

But the American finding has so unsettled governments, agencies and officials dealing with Iran that it has suddenly upended commonly held assumptions.

There is relief, as one senior French official put it, that “the war option is off the table.” There is also criticism and even anger in some quarters that the American intelligence assessment may be too soft on Iran.

Israel, for example, on Tuesday took a darker view of Iran’s nuclear ambitions than the American assessment, saying that it is convinced that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons and that it has probably resumed the weapons program the Americans said was stopped in autumn 2003.

The British government said the international community should maintain pressure on Iran over its uranium enrichment efforts. “It confirms we were right to be worried about Iran seeking to develop nuclear weapons,” a spokesman for Prime Minister Gordon Brown told reporters. He said the American assessment had also shown that past international pressure on Iran had succeeded “in that they seem to have abandoned the weaponization element.”

He added, “But it also tells us the intent was there, and that the risk of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons remains a serious problem.” That, he said, justified maintaining pressure on the Tehran government to abandon efforts to enrich uranium and to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, processes that could provide fissile material for nuclear weapons.

Iran’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, told state-run radio that Iran welcomed the change of opinion about its nuclear program. “Some of the same countries which had questions or ambiguities about our nuclear program are changing their views realistically,” he said.

A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, said the report showed that American accusations about Iran’s secret weapons activities were baseless, reported ISNA, the Iranian student news agency.

“This report can be good news for U.S. allies so that they would change their unreasonable policies,” he said, ISNA reported.

The International Atomic Energy Agency’s public stance, and the main message of Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general, was to praise the new finding as proof that his agency had been right in its analysis.

The American assessment “tallies with the agency’s consistent statements over the last few years that -- although Iran still needs to clarify some important aspects of its past and present nuclear activities -- the agency has no concrete evidence of an ongoing nuclear weapons program or undeclared nuclear facilities in Iran,” Dr. ElBaradei said in a statement.

He said the American intelligence assessment “should help to defuse the current crisis.”

But the agency has been frustrated by shrinking access for its inspectors in Iran, and Dr. ElBaradei also called on Iran to “accelerate its cooperation,” adding that the new American finding “should prompt Iran to work actively with the I.A.E.A. to clarify specific aspects of its past and present nuclear program.” He urged Iran to allow more intrusive inspections of its facilities.

Inside the agency, officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity under normal diplomatic rules, said that Iran must not assume that the American report relieves it of pressure to work with the agency, and that the country must do more to prove its good will.

“We are still worried about certain aspects of Iran’s nuclear program, and we need answers, particularly about so-called military aspects of the program,” said the senior official close to the agency.

Dr. ElBaradei’s most recent report to his agency’s 35-country board last month is less categorical in its conclusions than the American finding.

The agency acknowledged there were still “outstanding issues” regarding the scope and nature of the nuclear enrichment facility at Natanz and activities that could have military applications, Dr. ElBaradei said.

The American analysis twice describes the Natanz enrichment program as civilian, and omits the administration’s oft-cited analysis that there is no logical application for enriched uranium other than eventual military use. Referring to the finding’s characterization of uranium enrichment, the official allied with the international agency said, “We wouldn’t go that far.”

The official also refused to rule out the possibility that Iran might have programs involving centrifuges -- the machines that spin enriched uranium -- that it had not disclosed to the agency.

The agency plans to use the new assessment’s revelation that Iran had a nuclear weapons program in the past to pry more information out of it about its suspicious past activities.

“If they had a weapons program, they better tell us now,” the official said. “We need to know where they ended up with their program before they terminated it.”

--John F. Burns contributed reporting from London, and Nazila Fathi from Tehran.

4.

Columns

THE FLAWS IN THE IRAN REPORT
By John R. Bolton

Washington Post
December 6, 2007
Page A29

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/05/AR2007120502234.html

Rarely has a document from the supposedly hidden world of intelligence had such an impact as the National Intelligence Estimate released this week. Rarely has an administration been so unprepared for such an event. And rarely have vehement critics of the "intelligence community" on issues such as Iraq's weapons of mass destruction reversed themselves so quickly.

All this shows that we not only have a problem interpreting what the mullahs in Tehran are up to, but also a more fundamental problem: Too much of the intelligence community is engaging in policy formulation rather than "intelligence" analysis, and too many in Congress and the media are happy about it. President Bush may not be able to repair his Iran policy (which was not rigorous enough to begin with) in his last year, but he would leave a lasting legacy by returning the intelligence world to its proper function.

Consider these flaws in the NIE's "key judgments," which were made public even though approximately 140 pages of analysis, and reams of underlying intelligence, remain classified.

First, the headline finding -- that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 -- is written in a way that guarantees the totality of the conclusions will be misread. In fact, there is little substantive difference between the conclusions of the 2005 NIE on Iran's nuclear capabilities and the 2007 NIE. Moreover, the distinction between "military" and "civilian" programs is highly artificial, since the enrichment of uranium, which all agree Iran is continuing, is critical to civilian and military uses. Indeed, it has always been Iran's "civilian" program that posed the main risk of a nuclear "breakout."

The real differences between the NIEs are not in the hard data but in the psychological assessment of the mullahs' motives and objectives. The current NIE freely admits to having only moderate confidence that the suspension continues and says that there are significant gaps in our intelligence and that our analysts dissent from their initial judgment on suspension. This alone should give us considerable pause.

Second, the NIE is internally contradictory and insufficiently supported. It implies that Iran is susceptible to diplomatic persuasion and pressure, yet the only event in 2003 that might have affected Iran was our invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, not exactly a diplomatic pas de deux. As undersecretary of state for arms control in 2003, I know we were nowhere near exerting any significant diplomatic pressure on Iran. Nowhere does the NIE explain its logic on this critical point. Moreover, the risks and returns of pursuing a diplomatic strategy are policy calculations, not intelligence judgments. The very public rollout in the NIE of a diplomatic strategy exposes the biases at work behind the Potemkin village of "intelligence."

Third, the risks of disinformation by Iran are real. We have lost many fruitful sources inside Iraq in recent years because of increased security and intelligence tradecraft by Iran. The sudden appearance of new sources should be taken with more than a little skepticism. In a background briefing, intelligence officials said they had concluded it was "possible" but not "likely" that the new information they were relying on was deception. These are hardly hard scientific conclusions. One contrary opinion came from -- of all places -- an unnamed International Atomic Energy Agency official, quoted in the *New York Times*, saying that "we are more skeptical. We don't buy the American analysis 100 percent. We are not that generous with Iran." When the IAEA is tougher than our analysts, you can bet the farm that someone is pursuing a policy agenda.

Fourth, the NIE suffers from a common problem in government: the overvaluation of the most recent piece of data. In the bureaucracy, where access to information is a source of rank and prestige, ramming home policy changes with the latest hot tidbit is commonplace, and very deleterious. It is a rare piece of intelligence that is so important it can conclusively or even significantly alter the body of already known information. Yet the bias toward the new appears to have exerted a disproportionate effect on intelligence analysis.

Fifth, many involved in drafting and approving the NIE were not intelligence professionals but refugees from the State Department, brought into the new central bureaucracy of the director of national intelligence. These officials had relatively benign views of Iran's nuclear intentions five and six years ago; now they are writing those views as if they were received wisdom from on high. In fact, these are precisely the policy biases they had before, recycled as "intelligence judgments."

That such a flawed product could emerge after a drawn-out bureaucratic struggle is extremely troubling. While the president and others argue that we need to maintain pressure on Iran, this "intelligence" torpedo has all but sunk those efforts, inadequate as they were. Ironically, the NIE opens the way for Iran to achieve its military nuclear ambitions in an essentially unmolested fashion, to the detriment of us all.

--John R. Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is the author of Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad.  He is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

5.

ANTI-BUSH, EX-STATE DEPARTMENT BUREAUCRATS SABOTAGED THE IRAN NIE

RushLimbaugh.com
December 5, 2007

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_120507/content/01125107.guest.html

RUSH: The president flew to Omaha today in a campaign appearance, got off Air Force One and had more to say about Iran and the National Intelligence Estimate.

THE PRESIDENT: It is clear from the latest NIE that the Iranian government has more to explain about its nuclear intentions and past actions, especially the covert nuclear weapons program pursued into the fall of 2003, which the Iranian regime has yet to acknowledge. The Iranians have a strategic choice to make. They can come clean with the Internet community about the scope of their nuclear activities, and fully accept a long-standing offer to suspend their enrichment program and come to the table and negotiate, or they can continue on a path of isolation that is not in the best interests of the Iranian people. The choice is up to the Iranian regime.

RUSH: Meanwhile, Ahm-a-nutjob went up there to declare victory over the United States in light of this report. Yesterday we had news that the U.N. pretty much agreed with this report. Now they're sort of backing away from that. The French are not totally sold on this report. I want to play back for you something I said yesterday on this program about the NIE. Listen up.

RUSH ARCHIVE: [W]hen you hear Department of State -- what's the other one that sticks out to me here, CIA, of course, we knew they were in there. You put the Department of State in there, I guarantee there's more sabotage coming out of that place regarding the Bush administration, and in certain elements and certain rings of the Pentagon, you have to examine not just the motives of Iran and the intent of Iran, you gotta examine motives and the intent of the people at the NIE who put together this best guess of all of their estimates.

RUSH: All right. So last night on Studio B, Fox News Channel, Former Ambassador John Bolton is the guest. Shepard Smith said, with all due respect to the people who forecast hurricanes, it almost feels like those folks who get all the prediction wrong, it sounds like they're just throwing all this up in the air.

BOLTON: I really think the House and Senate intelligence committees have to look at how this NIE was put together, because there are a lot of unexplained points in here. I think there is a risk here, and I raised this as a question, whether people in the intelligence community who had their own agenda on Iran for some time now have politicized this intelligence and politicized these judgments in a way contrary to where the administration was going. I think somebody needs to look at that.

RUSH: Yeah, and I'll tell you who needs to look at it: members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, because all we've received so far is the key judgment. We have not received the full text of the report, but they have it, or they can get it. The full text will not be released to the public. It's got highly classified stuff in it, but they will get it. Somebody needs to look at the whole thing, see what it says in the report. This is a point made by Herb Meyer. Herb Meyer was a official in the Reagan administration. He was special assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence and Vice Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, and in these positions, Herb Meyer managed production of the U.S. National Intelligence Estimates during the Reagan administration. He writes this in AmericanThinker.com.

"In the Intelligence business, you get paid for just one thing: to be right. So here's the key question about the Key Judgment of the National Intelligence Council's new National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear intentions and capabilities: Is this judgment supported by the evidence? The judgment that's stirring up all the controversy -- and it's a real shocker -- comes in the very first sentence: 'We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program.' The judgment is astonishing for two reasons. First, it flies in the face of virtually everything we know -- or thought we knew -- about the Iranian regime, its capabilities and its intentions. Second, if the new Key Judgment is correct, it means that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program fully two years before publication of the National Intelligence Council's 2005 Estimate on this same subject, which concluded 'with high confidence' that Iran 'currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons.'

"Let's hope that the new Key Judgment is correct, because it would be very good news for world peace -- although it would raise the troubling question of how our Intelligence Community could have been so wrong back in 2005. But if the new Key Judgment is incorrect -- in other words, if Iran in fact is now building nuclear weapons -- the political impact of its publication will be catastrophic. That's because it will make it virtually impossible for President Bush to stop the Iranians by launching a military attack on their nuclear facilities or by working covertly to overthrow the regime itself. And, of course, it would raise even more troubling questions about the capabilities of our Intelligence Community." This is key. This is key: "[I]t will make it virtually impossible for President Bush to stop the Iranians by launching a military attack," because they're not developing their program anymore, so says the NIE. Who are they?

RUSH: Back to Herb Meyer, former national intelligence expert, Reagan administration. "To understand what to do next, keep in mind that all NIEs consist of two parts: the 'Key Judgments' and the text itself. It's the text that includes, or should include, the evidence that our intelligence agencies have gathered relevant to the issue at hand. Obviously, you complete the text before writing the Key Judgments, which emerge from the text itself. And because the Key Judgments are just that -- judgments -- it sometimes happens that the leaders of our various intelligence agencies will agree on the evidence but disagree about the meaning of the evidence. That's why there are often dissenting opinions within the Key Judgments.

"What was released on Monday is only the Key Judgments. The text itself hasn't been released -- and won't be, because the text presumably contains highly classified data relating to what we've learned about Iran's nuclear programs from all sources including, of course, our spies and satellites. But the text is available to leading members of Congress, including members of both the House and Senate intelligence oversight committees. Today -- right now, this instant -- every one of these individuals should get hold of a copy of the NIE and read it. More precisely, they should cancel whatever appointments and public events are on their calendars, turn off their cell phones, then sit quietly with a pen in hand and work their way, slowly and carefully, through the text of the NIE. And when they've done that, each Representative or Senator should step forward to report -- without giving details -- whether the Key Judgment about Iran's nuclear weapons program is, or isn't, supported by the evidence."

The only problem with this is that we're assuming that the members of these committees are smart enough to do this. "Given today's partisan political atmosphere -- and, even more distressing, the limited intellectual abilities of the people we elect -- this may not be sufficient to provide the confidence we need. . . . It is no exaggeration to say that Iran holds the key to whether or not the world is facing a nuclear war. Surely, it's worth an extra effort to be confident that this time, our Intelligence Community has got it right." That's Herb Meyer, served during the Reagan administration, special assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence and Vice Chairman of the National Intelligence Council.

Now, also at AmericanThinker.com today, a piece by Ed Lasky entitled: "The Suspect Provenance of the NIE Report." For those of you in Rio Linda, provenance is essentially credibility. "The Wall Street Journal editorial that ran this morning echoes and expands upon suspicions first articulated by the New York Sun that the National Intelligence Estimate was cooked up by bureaucrats eager to embarrass George Bush and transform US policy towards Iran." Well, I must say, ladies and gentlemen, I first raised those suspicions myself on this program and did so yesterday, and you just heard the audio sound bite of me from my program yesterday doing so. "A dynamic is at work that will serve Iranian interests by throwing a wrench in plans to expand sanctions against it for its nuclear program; it also will serve to veto any plans to attack its nuclear facilities." I cannot emphasize enough how crucial a point this is.

Because of this NIE Key Judgment that was put out on Monday, "they haven't been working on their nuke program since 2003," we're hamstrung now, folks. We can't attack 'em. We can't increase sanctions, and, of course, a number of Democrats in this country, leftists around the world, are already pointing fingers of blame at George W. Bush and warning him. The Russians are saying, "We're not going to help you increase sanctions on Iran, we're not going to do it." Politically it would be impossible to attack even if you had the evidence now, because of this report. "The three main authors of this report are former State Department officials with previous reputations that should lead one to doubt their conclusions." Would you go back, Mr. Maimone, grab audio sound bite number two. I want you to hear again, in my own words, what I said about all this yesterday, mounting suspicion. This was intelligence guided by experience, folks. This was not a wild guess.

RUSH ARCHIVE: [W]hen you hear Department of State -- what's the other one that sticks out to me here, CIA, of course, we knew they were in there. You put the Department of State in there, I guarantee there's more sabotage coming out of that place regarding the Bush administration, and in certain elements and certain rings of the Pentagon, you have to examine not just the motives of Iran and the intent of Iran, you gotta examine motives and the intent of the people at the NIE who put together this best guess of all of their estimates.

RUSH: Yesterday, that was me on this program. "The three main authors of this report are former State Department officials with previous reputations that should lead one to doubt their conclusions. All three are ex-bureaucrats who, as is generally true of State Department types, favor endless rounds of negotiation and 'diplomacy' and oppose confrontation. These three officials, according to the Wall Street Journal, have 'reputations as hyper-partisan anti-Bush officials.' 'They are Tom Fingar, formerly of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research; Vann Van Diepen, the National Intelligence Officer for WMD; and Kenneth Brill, the former U.S. Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)' Tom Fingar was a State Department employee who was an expert on China and Germany -- he has no notable experience, according to his bio in the Middle East and its geopolitics. Vann Van Diepen is also a career State Department bureaucrat, who, according to the New York Sun, is one of the State Department bureaucrats who want 'revenge' for having their views regarding Iran ignored by the Bush Administration. He is now seeking to further his own agenda.

"As the Sun wrote in their editorial yesterday: 'Vann Van Diepen, one of the estimate's main authors, has spent the last five years trying to get America to accept Iran's right to enrich uranium. Mr. Van Diepen no doubt reckons that in helping push the estimate through the system, he has succeeded in influencing the policy debate in Washington. The bureaucrats may even think they are stopping another war.' Vann Diepen also shares a lack of experience in dealing with Iran or the region. The third main author comes in for particular criticism in the Wall Street Journal editorial. Kenneth Brill served as the U.S. Ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (the IAEA). This is an agency that has served to enable Iranian's quest for nuclear weapons. The head of the IAEA, Mohamed ElBaradei, has even been called a friend by the Iranian regime. As he should be, for he has been an enabler of its nuclear weapons program and has stiff-armed European Union diplomats who have worked to restrain Iran. ElBaradei and the IAEA have over-reached and now seek to control diplomatic negotiations with Iran -- a function that is beyond its mandate. Brill was apparently unwilling to stop this mission creep and put an end to ElBaradei's efforts to help Iran. Or, as the Wall Street Journal hints, maybe he was just incompetent. This hint comes from former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton's (who headed counter-proliferation efforts in the State Department previous to his U.N. posting)," and he has a book out, you've heard what he said about all this on Fox last night.

"Brill also has no previous history of experience dealing with Iran. (He graduated from Business School at Berkeley in 1973.)" So exactly what a number of people have suspected is certainly true here. You have some disgruntled State Department people, one of them actively pursuing a program of allowing the Iranians to enrich uranium, sabotage, unhappy with the Bush administration. It's exactly the kind of thing that I suspected and feared yesterday, and the president is not backing down from this and he's not accepting this per se in the sense that this doesn't mean they're not a threat, this doesn't mean that they're not going to continue to try later on down the road, if they have, indeed, stopped. They're still enriching uranium, and you don't do that to drive cars around and provide electricity for the Iranian people.